The present invention relates to a supporting member, intended to be driven down into soil, clay, sand or any other foundation, and to serve as a load absorbing and supporting member.
For many fields of use, supporting members are required, which can be applied against a foundation lacking required load supporting capability, or with respect to foundations in which a certain movement can be expected in the foundation material. As base reinforcement for house building projects, pile driving methods are normally used today, whereby for instance concrete poles are driven down through a soft ground layer to a supporting ground layer. For construction work below water, cylindrical pipes are also used for certain applications, driven down through an existing soft bottom layer to a lower located solid rock or other firm layer.
With respect to both these methods, the supporting members must normally be driven down to a relatively large depth, which is time and cost consuming. Even with regard to simple construction work, e.g. small craft landing-stages, for which cylindrical pipes often are used to support the fixed portion of the landing-stage, considerable lengths of pipe may be required, resulting in joining operations being necessary, but also in high costs for the pipes utilized. Previously known load supporting members are also characterised in a relatively large weight, and also large longitudinal extension, which results in difficult and expensive transport to the construction site.